I Need A Heero
by silvershard
Summary: Even perfection needs someone to wipe away the tears. Self-injury
1. I Need A Heero

Walking in the rain - bloodsoaked and tearstricken, a tumultuous chaos tumbling through my mind - far too much perfection on the surface, bred and trained to be the one that fixes the world. And yet the cracks in my armor are seen all too easily if one bothers to look beyond - beyond their own needs, beyond the way they scream for my help when all I want is to crash and burn.  
  
It almost feels a little like pleasure to feel the way the cold water sinks into my flesh, a drenching downpour that I don't really want to escape - just like the dark swirl that I ride every night in my own heart as I watch you sleep, painted pretty in the scene behind my eyelids. It's so hard to realize that I already know what I need, and even harder to admit it to myself. Heaven forbid I admit it to you, the darkened angel.  
  
It seems sometimes that you're the one that's perfection - even though I've held that false title for so damn long that it seems a far more familiar mask than my own name. But I've never told you any of this, have I? I've never told you that I sit alone in my room, in my Gundam, in any dark place I can find at night and cry until the wrenching, sobbing pain wracks its agony through my heart, leaving me a broken mess in its wake. I never told you the reason why I have -all- of these scars - it's so very easy to simply chalk it up to the training, the war, the lack of childhood that I've gone through.  
  
I never told you that all I want is for you to find me, just once, seeking me out to talk or go drink coffee somewhere or to go get pizza and wipe away my tears. I never told you that I want you to come to me in the night when my hands are shaking and I'm clutching the blade so tightly that my fingers are white and my battered skin is red because it's the only way I can FEEL anymore and I don't deserve to feel anything else but this.  
  
I've never told you I l- but I can't say that word, I can't even think it.  
  
Please. I can't tell you that I need you. I can't tell you that when I stare at the night sky I see your eyes, your name written in the stars. I can't tell you that you're the light of my life and the reason that I don't press down just a little harder, even though I'm too afraid - yes, I am afraid. I'm so scared and lost and alone and I need you.  
  
Please. I need you and I don't want to be the strong one anymore. I don't want to be the Perfect Soldier. I don't want to be the cold, uncaring person that everyone sees because that's just not me, and you're the only one that I think has bothered to take a good look at this mask, because you have your own and know what it's like to hide. Please don't run away. Please don't leave me.  
  
Please come and bandage these wounds and hold me, because I don't think I can take another night of the rain pelting down across my back like gunfire, slamming the door just like everyone expects me to, not eating or sleeping for days because all I want is to bleed -  
  
My own little God of Death...  
  
Duo, please. I need your help. 


	2. Night Watch

I don't own Gundam Wing. I don't even have a plushie.

* * *

In solitude I sit at night, hidden within the darkened kitchen, while the other pilots slumber peacefully. He doesn't know that I watch him - that I see him slip out of his room oh-so-silently, that angry storm that always accompanies him crackling through the air. Every night I sit here on this same stool, hidden by shadows, wondering what preoccupies him so deeply that his training doesn't scream to him of my presence - I sit, watch, wait.  
  
It seems sometimes that there's something I can't quite catch - an air about him, a glint in his eyes, something that even our resident empath Quatre can't touch. Am I the only one who notices that what little light touched his gaze is gone?  
  
So burdened is he by the weight of the future, he doesn't notice as I follow him - it pains me knowing he bares his soul every night, and I can only be the silent observer, the quiet presence holding vigil for his sanity, during the starlit nights that he retreats to his Gundam. I would never have suspected, never in my wildest dreams, that the Perfect Soldier's escape at night was as violent as his silent days.  
  
I know that words would be easier for him than they are for me - but every time I see him screaming, tear-stricken in anguish, digging his nails into the well-worn fabric of the pilot seat, I have this incredible urge to write his pain in the stars for the entirety of civilization to see. "Can't you see what you're doing to him? Don't you know what you did with your "training," with the militaristic, hard drive to destroy a young boy's heart and soul?" Shinigami's rage boils thick and hot in my blood at the mere thought. I feel myself slipping into the familiar role with every breath I take - that sparkling shard of insanity that grips me, shaking my core, demanding retribution.  
  
There will never be just cause for what they did to him - what they forced him to do to himself.  
  
Shinigami knows that I've seen all of our Gundams stained with blood at one time or another - that I've held each one of them as they struggle to breathe, as consciousness wavers in and out, through all levels of pain and back - and every one of them has done the same for me. Even him. Not one of us has ever been left on his own as he bleeds, straining against instinct that screams to keep fighting, to never let go and never look back.  
  
But he bleeds alone.  
  
I finally said it. I finally admitted that I watch him at night, watch him screaming and sobbing - something that he has never allowed himself to do in front of any of us. I watch his ever-so-graceful hands fumbling at his pockets as he trembles, gasping for breath that refuses to come easily through the pain that wracks his body, and every time I see that telltale metallic glint my heart catches. I can't tear my eyes away from how sickly beautiful it is - the way Prussian eyes lock on tender skin, the sweet contrast of silver-and-flesh before his lips part just slightly in the quietest gasp as the switchblade is stained crimson, and his tears slow to a stop.  
  
Never once have I stopped resisting the urge to run to him, to slam into his Gundam and throw my arms around him, keeping him warm and safe as I carefully pry the blade from his hands. I've never once gone to him and rocked him against me through his tears, soothing the pain away with soft words and gentle hands, bandaging wounds within and without. Every single time I follow him all I can do is sit, barely breathing, tears catching in my eyes, watching the torrents of emotions warring through him, battles that he's only fought with himself. I know that he'd rather go up against a thousand men willing to die to bring him down than curl up in the deafening silence that follows his screams, nightmares brought to life, images that never cease to haunt him, follow him, taint every beat of his heart.  
  
And when it's over...  
  
When it's over, I watch the cool mask slowly slip over his face once more as he wipes the blade on his pants, slipping it into his pocket without a thought. Cringing as he harshly ties off his wounds, knowing that it's easier for him to hate himself than to ever fight the demons that call to him in the night. I know he doesn't even bother to wipe away the torrents of blood that stain his precious machine - in the end, he will always return, always stain the floor with that precious warmth, until it becomes forever the crimson of his dreams.  
  
As he walks away into the night... back to our little apartment, back to the life of the Perfect Soldier, that impenetrable fortress that he has been known for as long as he can remember, I know that he has to wipe away one last tear. Sometimes I wonder what he cries for - for the childhood that he lost? For the lives he has taken, the nightmares he's seen, the fear that we all feel every waking moment?  
  
But I continue to have this feeling that it's a little more than that - something that none of us anticipate, that none of us will ever be able to figure out on our own. I wonder if one day he'll see me there, waiting in the night, offering what little protection I have - guarding his most private moments in case the prying eyes of the other pilots would ever seek to penetrate his solitude. I wonder if he'll see the violet eyes or the braid of the joker - if he'll see what everyone else sees in me.  
  
I wonder if he'll see that maybe one day, I'll have the courage to tell him that I watch him not out of disrespect - or respect, for that matter. I watch him because my heart clenches to see him in pain, alone - because I, too, know what it's like to cry in the night, wondering if there's someone, anyone out there.  
  
Because I know what it's like to love a Heero.  
  
Maybe some day I'll be the one to wipe his tears away - but for now, I'll settle for making sure, night after night, that he's finally able to cry.


	3. Encounter

I don't own Gundam Wing. I don't even have a plushie.

* * *

I'm not entirely sure that I can detail the satisfaction that permeates my being when I pawn the guilt off on our enemies - they've never actually questioned once where the "extra" wounds come from, merely attributing them to the missions they believe I accomplish late at night.  
  
I wonder what would happen if they realized that I spend those nights carving the agony of my soul into my flesh for no one but the heavens to see.  
  
Unfortunately, however, I feel that I may have to stop my hidden nightly expeditions - a glint in the moonlight, night after night, has made me wary. Does one of them dare to intrude upon my solitude? Does the sickeningly considerate Quatre seek to soothe my wounds, to calm the rage that echoes upon the very essence of my being? Does Wu Fei come to claim that agony for his own, encroaching upon territory that my friends have never seen before - the treacherous, thundering roar of my blood in my ears, calling to me hauntingly, wishing to be set free -  
  
As I wish my soul could be set free.  
  
These memories haven't faded in the slightest - every day they grow stronger. Every moment I see glimpses of images, flashes of the pain that I've wrought in the lives of others. I hurt them, as well - every time I see them, I know I hurt them just a fraction more with my silence, my malice, my cold persona. But that's all it is -  
  
That's all it's ever been.  
  
Oh, he did a good job. The infamous doctor that carved his mark into my very DNA trained me well, forcing me into a confined status that I've never broken free from. Every battle I feel just a little more like I'm slamming into a glass wall, watching the sun shine on the other side as the rain pours down on me, soaking me with the reminder that I will never become worthy or good.  
  
That sums it up, actually. I can never be good. I can never be the compassionate friend of all, the one who mocks and defends in the same breath, the one who is the light of the world.  
  
The light of my world...  
  
And he doesn't even know that I can feel. He knows nothing of the tears that slowly trail down my cheeks as I rock back and forth, a desperate attempt to revert back to the childhood that I never had - God, I would give anything to be able to curl up against a warm figure, held safe and secure, able to cry myself to sleep, knowing that there will never be a danger as long as he's near.  
  
... Yes. He, Duo. I need him, my little Shinigami. Why can't it be him in the darkness? Why can't he be the one that glitters in the night, a fading beam of hope and starlight, the one who will come to me and calm my fears? Why can't he be the one that resurrects my faith, that gives me back what has been raped from me? Why can't he be the one, damn it, to give me the one thing that I've never had - happiness?  
  
Why can't he be the one to find me, broken and bleeding on the floor of my Gundam, lost forever to the eternity that flows from my veins -  
  
Why can't I put down this knife, this stained and cold knife, from which icy chaos flows into my veins - this dripping, awful, merciful blade that has never left my side from the moment that I took my first life -  
  
Why can't I put down this fucking blade, and fall into his arms?


	4. Just Another Night

Don't own them. Wish I did. Wish I had a plushie, too.

* * *

I couldn't help but worry about him. I mean... let's face it - the guys would be lost without me, especially him. He needs me. They all do, they just won't admit it! But I knew that I didn't have much of a choice when it came to the call of duty, so I pulled aside Trowa the night before Wu Fei and I went off on our little... ah... "excursion." I think I confused him. It's rare when the despicable Shinigami himself is serious outside of battle, and he knew something was up the moment he saw my eyes.

"Watch Heero." It was all I said; it was all I could say, unless I would actually betray him. I could never, ever do that; he hurts enough, night after night, and I just can't bring myself to be a part of it.

"Hi to you, too, Duo," he smiled, always the calm one. He thought for a few moments, and it was almost as if I could see his mind working, contemplating my words, trying to figure out just what it was that I wanted. "I don't think that's necessary. It's Heero, for goodness sake."

"Look, I can't explain it to you, but I'm leaving soon, and I need to know that somebody'll look out for him. Just trust me, okay? Don't say anything, just... just... I don't know, keep an eye on him. Make sure he doesn't blow himself up or something," I added, trying to make my voice sound as normal and playful as I could - trying to make it seem like I was just being the silly little prankster that everyone knew me as. "Maybe it'll bug him enough so that he'll finally crack and TALK for once!"

Trowa finally seemed to get what I was attempting to make him believe, and just nodded with a quiet smile. "I'll keep an eye out," he shrugged, patting me on the shoulder. "Good luck on the mission." With that, he walked away.

I could only sigh in relief. I just... I couldn't bring myself to let it go. I hadn't gone on a mission since the night I found him the first time, I'd never let him be alone while he was... doing that ever since. I knew Trowa wouldn't hold my silent vigil for me, but it was the best I could do, to make sure my Heero would still be here when I came back. With a sigh, I slipped back into my room, shoving a few things into my bag. I only hoped I could focus enough on this mission to keep myself from shooting Wu Fei in the foot by mistake...

"What is it?"

"Jesus, Heero, you jumped the hell out of me!" He had appeared out of nowhere, leaning casually against the doorframe. I hadn't realized how thin he'd gotten; still the strong, toned perfect soldier, but... he was gaunt, shadows under his eyes. I just couldn't let him know I was so worried... With a cocky smile, I turned, tossing a couple shirts at him. "Fold," I quirked as he caught them. I wouldn't have expected any less.

"Well?"

A man of few words. I knew what he wanted; it had become almost habit for us to talk about our missions, however brief. We'd been partners through so many of them that it always seemed odd to us when we were going off alone. "Hit and run," I replied softly. He knew how much I hated doing it this way; that I spent the time coming home thinking about who I'd just killed. Their families, lovers, what I'd just destroyed. He'd seen often enough what it does to me. All the guys knew that I didn't like it; he was the one that had seen it tear me apart. I think... I think that's when I started falling for him. When he just sat and listened as I cried, when he understood what I was saying and I didn't have to explain.

He watched me for a few moments before carefully placing the folded shirts in my bag. "I'll be here," he offered gruffly. I don't really think he likes it when I come to him. I think he only tolerates it to, well, you know, take one for the team. But... it's the most intimate time I've ever spent with him, and I'll take what I can get.

"Thanks." I felt guilty for being so short, but I couldn't help but stare off into the distance, cringing. Thinking about how many people I would kill tonight. Thinking that they wouldn't even expect it and would be crying out with their dying breaths before they had ever realized that I had come and gone already.

Maybe Heero and I weren't so different after all.


	5. Bloody Tears and Errant Fears

Thank you immensely to Joy2, Silverlie, and Lady-Frisselle for your reviews. They meant so much to me. And thank you everyone who has reviewed previously- I'm sorry I haven't gotten around to thanking you before. Joy2 - your review made me cry. Thank you so very much. I'm sorry for not updating sooner - I figured I'd update again quickly to appease the masses...

You know the drill - I don't own it, but dear God do I wish I did.

* * *

Suddenly I despised Wu Fei, just for a single moment. I hated that he would be there during the mission, by Duo's side in the depths of danger, and not even realize what would go through the playful Shinigami's mind. I knew what this would do to him. My mind spun dizzily with memories; having to haul Duo from an encampment littered with corpses - or those that were to be corpses, and simply didn't know it yet. Seeing the dull, glazed look in his eyes that I so often saw in the mirror, the look of one who had seen too much, too soon, too young. God, we were only children, and yet... I remember seeing the way he moved, brokenly, harshly as if he were attempting to become a robot, just so that he would not have to feel. The way he slid down the wall of my Gundam, staring silently into the darkness of space, before the tremors began. He always forced himself to watch the last detonations; always forced himself to stare into the fires until he knew that no one could ever have survived. And then he'd break.

He'd huddle in the corner as I brought us back sometimes; he usually didn't like to pilot alone on days like that. I remember just watching him sit there, my expression emotionless as he shook uncontrollably, breaths coming in short gasps as if he was doing everything he could to keep the tears back. He'd mumble over and over about how he wasn't weak, about how he should be strong. Like me.

Those were the words that made me break as well.

It wouldn't be until he reminded me in a tired, weary voice that we were both bleeding that I'd actually feel any pain. We needed to care for our wounds or we wouldn't make it home at all, he said, the tone of his voice the kind that... I'm not heartless.

I'm not.

I won't let myself be.

He simply looked so... lost and alone. He needed so badly, and I didn't have any supplies one day, and had to gather him in my arms after setting the coordinates, applying pressure just like I was taught. Just like I had done so many times for the others; just like they had done so many times for me. It wasn't foriegn to me, holding him like this as he trembled from the shock that made his body feel so cold. We'd all done it. What was foreign to me is... that day, the day that there were innocents involved. There was always the chance we would kill someone who didn't deserve it.

But Duo had never really, truly watched the look in a child's eyes as they lay dying from something that he had done. Not until that day.

He clung to me, almost uncomfortably tightly. I could give medical explanations for his actions until the sun crashed down around us, but that wasn't it at all. He needed me. Those wide, violet eyes stared up into mine as if the world was going to end if I let go. He needed me, and I...

I couldn't do that to him. I couldn't leave him alone. I remember every night how it feels to kill a child. I know the anguish and what it can do to a person if they handle it alone. I couldn't let the laughter drain out of Duo forever. I couldn't leave him to the fate that I had chosen for myself.

I held him. I wrapped my arms around him, whispering something I can't quite remember. Whatever it was, it worked; slowly, slowly the tremors stopped, and he began to cry.

It was heart-wrenching to see such a bright-hearted soul in so much agony. All I could do was hold him, rocking back and forth slowly as we gradually floated home. It amazed me that he had never been ashamed of this; he didn't ignore that it had happened, that he had lay his soul bare to me, willingly, trustingly. I had never seen this side of him. The one behind the mask; the boy behind the soldier.

That was the day I started praying again. Praying that one day I could show him the same.

He started coming to me then, casually chatting whenever one of us would have a mission without the other. We'd briefly discuss the layout and objectives, a safeguard against the fear that one of us would not return one day. It seemed safer, somehow, if someone knew what was happening. It was... odd, having someone who was truly interested in my missions - for ME, not for the objective.

I admit that it was difficult, opening up to him just that smallest amount. It forced me to ask myself if I cared for him or not.

That burning question in my mind was oddly comforting to me, during those nights that I found myself awake, wishing I were dreaming.

I forced myself to remain stationary, piddling my evening away at the computer as I heard the door slam. It was relieving to know that he was home, that -

"HEERO!" I shot up from my chair, hearing Quatre's voice, loud and urgent. Swiftly moving toward the living room, I inwardly paled at the sight.

My beautiful Shinigami, shaking as Wu Fei and Trowa held him up, the black fabric of his clothes darkened by shining liquid. He was bleeding, and I didn't know why.

"I'm so sorry, Duo, I couldn't, I, you, please," Wu Fei mumbled over and over, looking as if he needed medical attention as well. He suddenly collapsed into Quatre's arms, as Trowa looked to me, desperate for some sort of direction. "Do something!" his expression screamed, as he shifted Duo against him.

It took every fiber of my being to remain calm, grasping Duo in my arms and taking him back to his room. I shut the door, hearing everyone scrambling to tend to Wu Fei; they knew that I would be able to assist Duo on my own.

Sometimes I felt as if they had altogether too much faith in me.

His eyes opened slowly as I lay him on his bed, probing gently at his injuries as I removed his shirt. He had a rather nasty gash across his abdomen, and I suddenly felt lucky for all of the nights during my childhood that I had to fumble through the procedure of stitching my own wounds. Nice training.

"H...Heero," he stammered, teeth chattering. "Don't leave me."

A simple plea, but one that tore through me like ice. I started to clean him, even as his hand flailed to grasp my wrist. "I know, Duo," I replied softly. "I'm here."

"It hurts," he whispered, grunting slightly as the alcohol hit the wound. I knew he didn't mean the injury. "H...hate this. Hate me."

"I know," I murmured once more, slowly beginning to suture the soft, pale flesh of his stomach closed. "Duo, it is not your fa--"

He shook his head, interrupting me, swallowing hard, a wild look in his eyes. "I killed her," he whimpered, scrambling to get up. I had to press a hand to his chest, forcing him down until I had enough time to finish what I was doing. He rushed into my arms, a trembling, sobbing bundle of Shinigami. "Just kill me too!" He almost wailed, his tears hot against my neck as I held him. I had no idea what I was supposed to say now. His hand closed over a bandage wrapped firmly around my bicep, making me wince. He slowly shifted his gaze to mine.

He knew.

That shining in the distance... Duo KNEW.

The bloody, weak boy in my arms knew my deepest secret; and yet his eyes showed no disgust.

"I won't kill you, little one," I whispered hoarsely. "You're not the one who deserves to die."

He clutched me tigheter, staring up into my eyes with desperation. "Heero, don't leave me!" He demanded again, sobbing into my skin as he fell against me tiredly. "I'll do anything. Please, God, don't leave me!"

As I held him, his words rolled around in my mind, a terrible crescendo of feelings and thoughts that ran through me uncontrollably. All I could do was keep him close, uncertain. It shocked me to think that... he actually... did he...?

As he drifted off into an exhausted sleep, I wondered if I was hallucinating.

Did he just whisper "I love you" ?


	6. Mist and Memory

If I owned it, do you really think I'd be writing fanfic?

* * *

Everything seemed so... so... bleak, all of a sudden. Different missions ran through my head the whole way there, various dangers and excitements - it seems as if things like this wouldn't really be exciting, you know? But there's always this heady rush, this drunken giddiness just beforehand when you realize what's at stake, what you're risking. 

I thought of the first few times I'd been partnered with Heero - either by default, or due to the other pilots' sick sense of humor. He was so easily irritated then... not that he's much different now, right? It was so easy for me to tease him, to gleefully act out every impulse of Shinigami's trickster persona in front of him. We all began taking bets on how long it would take before he either cracked a smile, or cracked my skull.

Somehow... I can't really remember how it happened. When he started to really look at me. When he stared straight at me and saw everything. I think... I think it was maybe halfway into the war, deep into the nighttime. I remember ... actually, come to think of it, that was pretty bleak, too. There were so many bodies. So many... not bodies, PEOPLE! God... I'd never seen that many people up close before. It had always seemed so far away from me, you know? But suddenly it was just so crystal-clear to me. Those people could be one of my friends. Those people could be me. Those people could be someone's sister, or mother, or baby brother, and I am the one responsible for taking them away, for forcing violence and death into lives that might have been peaceful and full of joy.

I think that's about when I began throwing up.

I don't really remember what happened after that. It was like I went blind. All I could feel was Heero's hand on my arm, dragging me back to his Gundam. Nothing mattered anymore. Nothing. Not ever. And it just hurt so bad to walk away from those people. I just... wanted to stay there. To become them.

The next thing I remember is Heero. Just... Heero. Somehow it didn't shock me - I think I was already too shocked for much of anything else to get through - that he was holding me. He told me later that I wasn't even crying, but... he felt so warm. And I was so very terribly cold.

That's when I started to trust him. To tell him things, a little bit at a time. No one has ever really been there for me like that, and it felt so good, so right. His eyes were so blue then... and he wasn't even scowling. I never told anyone about that. It seemed too sacred.

It hurt, though, when I realized that from that moment on, I couldn't hide it anymore. I couldn't wait until we got back and take out my frustrations on a wall, or a video game, or to pretend everything was all right. I couldn't even laugh it off. Every single time I was with him I just collapsed, almost. Drained, to the point where I couldn't even think. It got to the point where I think he actually forced his way to being permanently partnered with me, whenever he could help it. All without me even realizing it until about six months later, when I counted the missions I'd been on, and realized that every single one involved Heero.

I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have survived this long without him.

That's... that's why I started following him. I felt bad about it... I really did. But it just seemed so wrong to leave him alone like that, when he didn't leave me alone when I fell apart. I figured it would make him just... shut down if I intruded... so I began to watch.

I didn't think about any of this until I got shipped off with Wufei. I was so used to him being there that... I didn't realize how much I needed him.

Oh, God, how I needed him. Wufei wouldn't know what to do with an emotion if he fell face-first into it. There was no time to think; just act, and, well...

I acted.

I acted, and I watched her die. This... kid, barely old enough to hold a gun, let alone figure out what to do with it. This kid that they'd recruited just to fill up the ranks with numbers, to act as something for the enemy to hit so no one "important" would die. I fucking acted, and I WATCHED HER DIE IN FRONT OF ME!

I watched her die, with her blood flowing down my hands. I watched her die, as she screamed and cried in terror. I watched her DIE, begging me not to hurt her anymore. I WATCHED HER DIE, AND WHISPER TO HER PARENTS THAT SHE LOVED THEM!

I don't remember very much after that. I still don't know what happened, a few days later.

All I remember is the look in Heero's eyes when I told him that I wanted him to kill me. I meant it. I swear to God I did. I still do, sort of. But... I think... he figured it out. That I follow him. And I don't want to die unless I know that he isn't mad at me, you know? I just... all I wanted was for him to not be alone. I'm not sure, though, if I dreamed it... that he thinks he should die, too.

Considering the dreams I had, I wouldn't doubt it. But... just in case it was real...

Someone has to tell him that he shouldn't be ashamed. We all do something. I don't lie... I just live a lie. Wufei has the worst anger management problem I've ever seen. Quatre and Trowa... are deviants, but at least they're deviants with each other, you know? Not that I'd mind being a deviant with a certain someone else, hah!

But that isn't the point. It's too much for us to handle by ourselves. We all have our vices. The only way I could think of to tell him, though... was to tell him how I feel. I just hope he heard me - and not just with his ears.

"Duo? Are you awake?"

Oh, hell.


	7. Death Awakens

Don't own 'em. Wish I had a plushie.

* * *

I watched the braided baka laying against the bed, stirring every so often. It seemed almost as though his dreams were as tortured as mine - the nightmares that tore through my mind even during my waking hours, splitting my consciousness between the pain and the present. 

During the few days that Duo lay unconscious, his body warm and trembling with fever, I watched him. I watched him like I thought he watched me, wondering what he saw in those dark, starlit nights. I watched him twist and turn, wincing even in his slumber, reaching out for something, someone. My hand drifted to the washcloth of its own accord, slowly moistening his lips as he whimpered and dreamed. I found myself taking care of him without even realizing it - and I tried not to think about what he'd said.

I tried not to think about whether or not he was talking to a dream or a hallucination. I tried not to think about my sudden revelation, that he'd followed me. How dare he follow me? How dare he intrude upon my private thoughts? What made him think I wanted him to do that? What possessed him -

"Duo? Are you awake?" I asked suddenly, those long lashes fluttering at me. At times I wish he'd trim the damned things so he wouldn't look so... so... Nevermind.

"Uhm?" The sleepy-eyed Shinigami slowly shifted his gaze up to me, a slightly confused look on his face. "Am I dreaming? I think I'm dreaming. I've had this one before, I'm sure of it, but usually you're IN the bed..." He grinned coyly at me, and I resisted an urge to return a scathing comment. He was injured, after all.

"Can you sit up?" I held my arm out for him to steady himself, and was unable to meet his eyes. He grasped my wrist gently, giving me a serious look.

"I'm fine, Heero," he replied softly, his eyes dark and soft. It was almost as if the whole of his heart was poured into those shimmering orbs; the gaze he gave me took my breath away. I knew what he wanted to know, as he shifted his hand up my arm toward my elbow, testing me, seeing if I would react.

"Do you wish that I bring you some food? Or would you like assistance to the shower?"

"Damn it, Heero! Every single time I try to talk to you, you shut down. This is EXACTLY why we both sit in our rooms at night, staring out the window, wanting to know why we're still in this fucking life. Every. Single. Time. You always run away from me, and I am NOT going to let that happen." It wasn't often that someone could silence me with their words, and yet I found myself unable to speak, unable to move. Time itself seemed to slow, and then stop, as every moment of my life flew past my mind rapidly - vague feelings of pain, of terror. Memories of darkness and then... and then nothing. My memories took a metallic twist, turning into emotionless images that I couldn't find my way through. Death. Destruction. Torment. Torture. And at the end, I held the blades. The whips. The guns. Moment after moment I was assaulted by memories, lost in the blood-stained past.

"Heero?"

What was that? Who...? I shook my head, trying to pull away, reaching for my belt pocket as I went to move toward the door. A hand tightened on my forearm, tight enough to hurt, and I blinked, suddenly staring into the eyes of Death himself. "Duo?"

He watched me for a few moments, waiting for the haze to clear from my eyes. "I think... I get it," he murmured slowly, his thumb stroking at the flesh beneath it slowly. "But Heero... I didn't follow you to hurt you, or spy on you. I just..." Eyes shifted down, staring at the bandages. He laughed ruefully, disgusing his pain - I knew him too well for him to lie to me with a glance. At times, anyway. "I just thought you deserved someone to watch your back, you know? To make sure nobody else just ran into it and asked what the hell was going on. I mean.. it's not like you're the only one. But nobody should make you hurt more "for your own good." I think you've had enough of that."

It took me a breath or two to stumble my way through that convoluted, rambling explanation, and as I sorted my thoughts, he tugged at my shirt lightly. "Do you really understand, Duo?" I replied quietly, trying to gain the courage to answer the questions he so obviously wished to ask. "Do you... do this...?"

The braid flew this way and that slightly as he shook his head. "Nah. But that doesn't mean I don't get it. I pretend, or play stupid games. Or hit things. But you..." It was hard not to watch that long, pretty hair as he shook his head again. "We all got stuff to deal with from the past, right? But some of us got the chance to deal with it. You just... were drowned in it, and I don't think that they ever wanted you to get to the surface."

"Thanks, Duo," I murmured softly. "For... not stopping me." His fingernails traced along my skin, still stained with dirt and blood. Taking a deep breath, I wondered if it was time to ask for what I longed for. For what I needed for so long.

"It's okay."

Shaking in terror, I sat next to him, wondering if that was all he had to say. It seemed as if I shouldn't have these feelings, and I needed so badly to flee, to run through the apartment outside, to...

His hand lay against my upper arm, stroking it lightly, watching me wince. "I promise. It's okay."

Perhaps I would have the courage after all. Then again, feeling his hand gently over the expressions of my inner torment...

Perhaps not.


	8. Starlit Rainbows

Don't own 'em. Really, really wish I did. Or even the boxed set. Or plushies. I know a wonderful plushie site...

* * *

I really did think I was dreaming when I woke up with Heero practically collapsed across my bed. I mean... come on, who hasn't had that one before? Athletic, strong Heero, crossing the bedroom and - 

With that thought, let's move on. Before I get myself into a position where I can't tell this story for awhile, all right?

I even told him that, trying to ease some of the worry in his eyes. I know he's always tense, that there's something... vaguely metallic and bloody behind his eyes whenever he looks at me. It gives off this aura of death and destruction mixed with bittersweet wistfulness, and it's enough to break anyone's heart - especially mine.

But the joke didn't cut it, didn't even get me an insult for my troubles, and... well, I think that's when I started to get worried. It felt great to have him tending to me, taking care of me, but something didn't feel right; something was terribly off, and we both knew it.

I shouldn't have tested him. I know, I really shouldn't have - but when he went to help me up, I couldn't help it. I wondered if he'd stop me, if there would be a point he wouldn't let my hand slid up his arm anymore - if he'd jerk away and mutter angrily at me, storm out of the room altogether... any of these I could see him doing, easily. Especially if I'd brushed his hair out of his eyes, the way I really wanted to.

Have you ever seen him like that? With that tiny spark of vulnerability in those Prussian orbs, his hair falling ever-so-artistically across them... my God, I need to learn to paint. Badly.

But he just shut down, even when I yelled at him for it. Even when I told him that my gut wrenches with loneliness and pain every night because he's not there, that sometimes I don't really feel like I have any reason left, that I should just ... one of these days... let go of the controls and let my Gundam drift until it slams into something that will finally let me not wake up. Ever. I told him everything I could without actually telling him, and it seemed as if I held his attention by a spiderweb's threads - I could feel him tensing again, I could feel the way his blood ran hot through his veins.

It's amazing to watch it, whatever it is. His skin gets so warm, almost as if his body is attempting to burn away whatever memories haunt him - to burn away his consciousness, leaving him truly the empty shell they had meant him to be. As if there's this half-finished program lurking within him somewhere, trying to complete its task, to kill away everything left of his will, his mind, his heart. And his eyes...

God, you could fall into that ocean and never come back, drifting endlessly in the sea of Heero. I just... I wish that I could know what's happening when he does that. He just stops moving, like every cell in his body ceases following their own little paths to do their duties, like everything in him is so completely still - but then it happens. And it's awful.

His eyes just... go dark. Almost black. Flat and dead, his skin cold, as if he were one of the living dead. I've only seen it happen once, and none of us were sure that Heero would live through it - it had probably happened before, and I know if Heero kept going this way, it would happen again, but whatever light that kept him alive seemed to fade away as he bit his tongue to bleeding, trapped inside himself. Horrifying; the sight of slippery crimson emerging from his soft, pale lips, staining them with memories of dying by inches.

Heero had done nothing but spend his life dying by inches.

It took four or five times of calling his name - as well as a few choice swearwords - to get him to snap out of it, to get that coldness to recede. His confusion was evident, and I panicked. I just... couldn't think. I knew what he was going to do, and I felt like that knife he kept in that pocket was stabbing me in the fucking heart with every movement he made. So I... I hurt him. I didn't mean to, but it was the only thing I could do! I just... felt so helpless. And I didn't really realize I was doing it until he gasped, eyes focused on me, looking up at me through the stinging pain of my hand on his arm.

I can barely remember speaking to him, desperate, saying anything that came to mind. I mean, I know I do that all the time - talk before I think - but for some reason, I just... poured out everything that came to mind when I thought about him, when I went to guard him at night.

And you know what? I think it actually got to him. Maybe not all at once, but I think it stuck in his mind a little, so he could think about it. Heero's the kind of guy that doesn't really make a decision quickly if he can help it. I'm pretty sure there's going to be a chart or graph involved when he decides he's ready to talk again. Do you think I could get him to write some kind of computer program thing for me that puts in all of the stupid stuff I say to him, and gives me the percentage of getting smacked if I actually say it?

I watched him leave after that, with that "I'm thoughtful, and really attractive... but I don't know it" look on his face, and sat back in my bed. It was almost enough to close my eyes and breathe in the lingering scent of him - metal, blood, clean sweat and... something. Something... man, at this rate, I should just raid his bathroom cabinet and find out what the hell aftershave he uses.

And then apply it to my pillowcase.

... Anyway. As I sat and thought, I vaguely remembered one of the girls that was with some guy I didn't really know, but he hung out with our gang anyway. She was a pretty little thing, pale skin, grey eyes. Every time I saw her, she had a different hair color, but the last few months I knew her, before I... uhm... "acquired" my Gundam, she kept going back to this rich, dark red. I remember one night we were just... hanging out, as kids usually waste their time doing, and as we lay there and looked up at the stars, I asked her about it. She told me she dyed her hair to match her mood, and lately, she just hadn't been feeling that cheerful. It made me sort of sad that this pretty young girl was so... down, and I asked her if there was anything I could do.

"Yeah," she said, real quiet, to me, and she yanked up her sleeves and showed me her wrists. "Don't hate me." I couldn't tell if she just did it because she needed to, or because she was actively trying to end it, but it looked like she had taken the jagged edge of a tin can lid to her wrists, real deep. All I could think to do was ask her why. And I just... looked into her eyes as I asked, and she didn't say anything. But I saw this overwhelming sadness, and pain, like she'd seen and done too much. Like it was a thick blanket smothering her that she couldn't get out from under, and she was trying to cut it away piece by piece. She smiled at me then, and just stared up at the sky some more.

I wonder whatever happened to her. Maybe she could tell Heero that it really will be okay.


	9. Never Surrender

Don't own 'em. Want plushie. Just warning you: This one's a bit dark, folks. Kind of like the first chapter.

* * *

I wondered what Duo would do, were I to wander out to my Gundam, again, this night. If he knew, would he follow me, digging his nails into his palms to stifle the pain of his injuries? It probably wouldn't be the first time. I wish I knew how long he's been following me, trailing me through the twisting paths of woods, as perfectly silent as his alter ego would be. My little Shinigami seems to be quiet clever when he wants to slide into the darkness, become a shadow - until the night he began forgetting to tuck in that damned cross of his.

But I digress.

I hadn't expected him to ... scold me, as if I were some errant school boy, picking on someone in class. I hadn't counted on that... chilling tone of his voice that somehow... I can't even begin to describe the depth of what it had done to me. I realize now he was concerned, even - dare I speculate - worried, but at the time, it simply reminded me of... things that I believed had been forgotten. Duo is quite adept at removing every particle of emotion from his voice, if necessary, and that cold, unmerciful tone chilled me, throwing me headlong into the past.

Far be it from me to complain that he intruded upon the moment, forcing me to snap out of it, yet I ... feel very much as if he'd hit me in the back of the head with the proverbial board. I wonder if he's ever known what it feels like to shut down, almost as if one were a human machine. It's actually pretty bizarre, in the way that you find amusement in things that you would be absolutely horrified at if you didn't laugh a little.

Yes, I realize what I just said, and believe it or not, I do have a sense of humor.

A very small sense of humor, granted, but it exists, thank you.

And that is precisely how I feel now - as if one by one, emotions were shut down. First - fear. Always fear first, lest I fully realize the potential of fear and break these fucking bonds that they put on me!

... Excuse me. I'm certain you understand now that the last to go is anger, which apparently gives me quite the vocabulary if I choose to use it.

However... as I walked, I found myself at my Gundam, always walking toward it, my salvation. My non-living salvation, I suppose. Climbing into the familiar cockpit, I sat in my usual corner, staring at the hard metal in front of me. It was comforting, that slightly dented, - from Duo's foot, if I recall correctly - slightly bloodstained piece of metal. My thoughts swam in the murky waters of a place I'd never been - deep, true emotions. The kind of emotions that were supposedly not painful, the ones that united hearts and minds. His words echoed over and over again:

"We all got stuff to deal with from the past, right? But some of us got the chance to deal with it. You just... were drowned in it, and I don't think that they ever wanted you to get to the surface."

I hate to admit it, but he's right. I think about those words, twisting them in my mind, hear voices rising outside my Gundam as I hunch over slightly, trying to disappear.

I despise the way everything gets crystal-clear and focused, and yet at the same time dizzy and unsteady; the way the world wavers before my eyes, and I hate knowing that it's because I can't cry.

Maybe I have without realizing it, maybe I've never been able to, but my mind is elsewhere, on the way the metal spins in front of me, hypnotic and ... breathless... yes...

.. What...? A familiar feeling, but one that I usually know I'm inflicting on myself - my hand, of its own accord, tugging the blade from its sheath, the silver flashing ... just like Duo's cross... I felt as if I shouldn't be doing this - I know it hurts him. And I... think I care. That... it hurts him.

And yet I cannot, will not let these feelings bubble to the surface and emerge - I cannot sacrifice what I am. The others depend on the Perfect Soldier. And so it must be...

But for now, for tonight, I stop fighting the feeling, stop worrying about what Duo might say. If he would say anything at all. It hits me that this time I'm truly alone, and Duo wasn't out there watching me - for some reason it drove into me like shards of a broken mirror, a mirror that I could never look into, for if I had, I would have faced myself.

Never. Surrender.

Each word a mantra as I succumb to that feeling - it feels like the air before a tremendous thunderstorm, crackling with electricity and power, always needing to be released... building until the sky breaks and its tears rain down on all of us, absolving us. I watched the rain thunder against my Gundam as I sat inside, numb, sliding the blade across a spread of flesh that was whole - it seemed an insult to this terribleness welling up inside of me to leave it that way. Never. Surrender. Never...

...drip...

... Surrender...

...drip; drip...

Over and over and over and I can't stop, not right now. Please, Duo, don't make me. I'm just not ready. I just need to feel it, I need to stop the numbness, I need to unleash the torrents of electric heat pouring through me restlessly, always moving, never ceasing. Building. Building higher and higher until I succumb, I ... surrender... to the feeling.

To the punishment. To the pain. To FEELING something, damn it! To prove I really am alive. That I can be something other than what everyone needs me to be. That I can have control of my own body, that I... can...

I blinked a little, staring down at the mess I had made of myself, and swore sharply. Duo would never understand, not this, never this.

But maybe just a little more, until the dizzy, spinning blankness takes me away again, so for just awile, I can be free.


	10. I'm Sorry

Don't own 'em. Want plushie.

* * *

It occurred to me that I might want to go and find him, eventually. Just to make sure that he hadn't actually, you know, really felt something and keeled over from the shock. But if Heero came up against something he couldn't deal with, I doubt any of us could help him. I mean... seriously, he's Heero. They call him the Perfect Soldier for a reason.

Though, really, I think I'm going to kill whoever came up with that little title. It seems to have served him way too well. That thoughtful little look in his eyes when he left looked a bit too... confused. Like he had no idea as to what the hell he should do with the feelings I sort of stuck in his head.

But while I was spending my time thinking about Heero, about the way I woke up to him being there... I realized I couldn't sleep. And yeah, I know, he's going to kill me for getting up, but it's not like I'm going to bleed to death. So I got up, and really, I think he doesn't give me enough credit. I'm not exactly fragile. I've been shot, blown up, thrown in a ditch, stabbed, slashed, strangled, tortured and I'm still here - we all are. Isn't it sort of... our job to get blown up a little bit? You don't exactly become a Gundam pilot without realizing that eventually somebody's going to hit you. Repeatedly.

So I wandered to his room - shirtless... well... for no good reason - and knocked. Hey, if a guy doesn't answer, doesn't that mean you're allowed to open the door and see if, I don't know, they got blown out of a window? So I went in. And his room... was actually pretty surprising. It was neat, yes, and his bed was made with hospital corners, for crying out loud - but I didn't expect the notebooks. Those little black and white ones that they make you have for school, that you write in every day, usually "I ate a hot dog. I hate school." and that's pretty much it? Stacks of them, on a small set of shelves. All neatly labeled, because I looked. I know, I shouldn't have, but if YOU were in Heero's room, wouldn't you? This was a once in a lifetime opportunity, people. To see into the mind of the one and only Perfect Soldier - and the hottest guy I've EVER met - would be a chance I probably wouldn't ever get again, with the way things were going.

Flipping through them, I couldn't help but smile at his small, precise writing - everything about Heero seemed to be official, on the outside. But like this book, on the inside, something's a little different. It seems Heero had a journal - never a diary, heaven fucking forbid the day you mention to Heero Yuy you believe he has a diary - and while much of it detailed our missions, there were a few interesting tidbits. Written with some obscure dating that I'm fairly certain hasn't been around for decades:

"12/24

At the designated point. The informant has not yet appeared, and I am in a secure location.

That said, when he gets here, I would very much like to rip his fucking eyes out. I've met him before, on dates including 9/03, 6/08, and several others. He always seems to be testing me, seeing if he can make me snap. He has that look in his eyes, that he wants proof that I am the Perfect Soldier.

So maybe I'll prove it to him. It might even make this day bearable.

Merry Christmas."

I'm not entirely certain if he was serious or not, but I do remember that night. He came home with this... primal, feral look in his eyes, as if he were an untamed, wild cat, stalking his prey. It took my breath away. I wish he'd look at me that way again...

The next few entries took my breath away too, but for a different reason. The writing was jagged and loose, scrawling all over the page, screaming his pain for only his eyes to see, bearing witness to the uncontrollable rage and agony that built up inside of him.

Flipping to the entries for the past few days, I dropped the book and ran, only to grab the wall to keep from falling. Damn. Heero was right, I shouldn't be up, but the words kept roaming through my mind as I moved as fast as I could, grabbing my jacket, out the door, despite the protests of the other pilots. I think it was Trowa that held them back, and I reminded myself to thank him later.

I never, ever would have thought that Heero could ask for help. That he would write about his various torments, write why he does this to himself. Write my fucking name dug into the page like he had pressed in as much as he dared, "Duo, please. I need your help." And I never fucking listened to the way he kept to himself too much, unusual even for him lately. To the way his eyes were losing a bit of their light, like they had before, every time he's gone too long...

But it felt a bit different, this time, and as I knocked on the door of his Gundam, barged in as he didn't answer, I finally saw what he would never have the courage to show me. His flesh cut to ribbons, words slashed into his arms, unreadable through the blood, through... if I read it right, through the evidence of the only way he could cry. I knew what he did here, but I never imagined it would be like this. It looked sort of like he'd just... lost it, letting go of everything holding him here.

And his eyes were so soft as he looked up at me; I could have stared into his eyes forever, but he sighed. "Duo," he stated - that's all it was, a statement so quiet that I could barely hear it as I carefully gathered him up from the ball he'd curled into, bracing him against my chest, digging for the med kit he always kept in here - the "other" med kit. His eyes were just so gentle, so shocking that I held him, the kit on his lap, my fingers gently stroking the bleeding flesh, and with a sadness I never knew he could even feel, he smiled at me, and whispered, "I knew one day you'd come. Now I can sleep..." Those vulnerable, childlike words tore through my heart and I put pressure on the wounds, trying to think as I cried - I was crying? When did that happen? - and started trying to fix the mess he'd made. Before he really did sleep.

"It's okay," I whispered over and over, the irony that I'd said it a mere hour ago about just such an event like this not lost on me. When I said it, I never figured he'd just rush out and...

I think that we have an awful lot to discuss if I can pull this off without making it worse.

I'm sorry, Heero. Sorry that I never knew, that I never came to help you. That I only watched, I'll only watch if you want me to. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry...


	11. Chaos and Confusion

Don't own 'em. Want plushie. (Warning: Short. It's meant to be confusing.)

* * *

Pretty. Everything looks so pretty. It looks like snow, like when snow falls thick and looks like static, snow falling in my eyes. And warm. 

Warm and I think today that I am flying, because eternity feels weightless, and that is all right. That is peace, today, and maybe my angel has come.

"...It's okay..." Is that my angel? I'm here, Duo, can you hear me?

"...Duo? What the hell? Open the door!" No, Duo, don't let them, please? Make it stop!

"...got it covered... explain... tomorrow..." But the words are fading in and out, and I think maybe something's wrong this time. But it's so warm! How can it be wrong if this feels so good, so safe? I feel like I'm floating, floating and he's holding me, and it's... just...

"OPEN THE DAMNED DOOR OR I'LL SHOOT IT OFF!" Duo, make them go away, leave me alone, I just want to sleep...

"I SAID IT'S COVERED! HE'S... AND I'VE GOT... NO!" Duo, what's going on? Why are you yelling? Duo, don't yell, don't yell and don't let them hurt me, please? It hurts when they come and I'm scared, where am I? You'll take me away from here, right? Right?

"It's okay, Heero, just relax..." Duo... I can see them, it's too bright and it HURTS, make it go away, make it stop! NO NO NO!

"But he's SCREAMING!" No! No, I want my mommy! Come back! Don't hurt me! I'll be good, don't take me away, don't leave me...

"Oh, God, Heero... hold on, I'll --" I'm scared and I ... I... no I'm safe, it's okay they'll come save me they don't hurt kids right? People don't hurt little kids everything's okay --

-bang- DON'T! WHY ARE YOU HURTING ME GO AWAY GOAWAYGOAWAYGOAWAYGOAWAY!

"Quatre he's... I can't... the door!" STOP! I DON'T WANNA!

"Shit!" ... it's cold now... no more hurt? Mommy? D...Duo? Wait, where --

"I don't know what to do! He's... and you -- NO HOSPITALS! -- Wait, where the hell is he bleeding from?" Why can't you hear me? Am I dreaming? Wake up! Please, listen to me, don't, not again, I'll fucking kill you you son of a bitch!

((eyes flash/world dark/guns/knives/cold metal/blackness))

"Oh, God!"


	12. Chaos Redux

Don't own 'em. Want plushie. (Thanks for all the reviews, guys. I promise I'm not done with this fic yet, no worries! Poor Duo.)

* * *

No words.

I have no words for this. No words for ... for... this carnage, this brutality. No words at all.

It's absolutely incredible, staring down at the bleeding boy in my arms, feeling the burning of my own wounds, two pilots bound together by common purpose and agony. And it's not often I get poetic.

But there's just nothing I can say about the fucking mess that the "Perfect Soldier" has made of himself, and I can only respond to the slamming against the door after the shock slams into me. "I've got it covered, I'll explain what's going on tomorrow, guys." Hands working frantically to open the damned package - who the fuck thought it was a good idea to make these so hard to open? They are SO getting sued if Heero fucking DIES because I can't open the goddamn thing!

His lips are blue. Wait, what the hell does that even mean? I thought that was hypothermia, it's not that fucking cold - "OPEN THE DAMNED DOOR OR I'LL SHOOT IT OFF!"

Oh, for the love of God, even I'm not this melodramatic. "I SAID IT'S COVERED! HE'S FINE, AND I'VE GOT IT UNDER CONTROL, GET THE FUCK AWAY! NO I WILL NOT OPEN THE DOOR! NO!" I can feel him shaking, trembling against me as gasps and whimpers come from some nightmare that only he can see. But his eyes are half-open and it's almost like he's looking straight at me...

"No! DUO MAKE IT STOP! Please, God, just fucking go away, I'LL FUCKING SHOOT YOU!" He's screaming now and I don't know what to do - he's never lost it like this before, we've all had our fucked up moments but what the hell do I do now? He's calling my name like I'm his fucking savior, and there's nothing. I. Can. Do. I can't make this stop, I can't fight his demons for him, and why the hell is there so much blood on my hands?

"It's okay, Heero, just relax, I've got you, you're okay..." Why can't he hear me? I know he's awake, but ... Oh, God, his eyes. My hands stop, pressed against his arm as I stare down at him, drowning in Prussian blue, the terror and fear mounting, pressing toward insanity and - something I can't quite name. He looks so lost... so innocent...

"But he's SCREAMING!"

"NO SHIT he's screaming, Trowa, just back the fuck off, okay? Give me a minute, let me get him secure, okay? I'll let you do your shit, just BACK THE FUCK OFF AND LET ME DO THIS!" Panic, panic, it's like he's projecting his fear onto me, and the entire world seems to stop

shudder

blackness

fear.

Is this what he sees when he closes his eyes? Is this what he's feeling? I mean... my God, I've got my fucked up war memories and there will be more, but he looks like raw nerves are exposed - hell, they probably are, and I suddenly remember that I should be applying pressure. Okay. Grabbing the goddamned knife from his lifeless fist, the gauze is open, everything will be fine, it's okay, isn't it? Heero? YOU'RE the one who reassures ME!

"Oh, God, Heero... hold on, I'll fix it, I promise I'll fix it, see? I'm wrapping it up nice, all neat so you won't have a spaz attack when you wake up, and you'll yell at me and call me a baka and everything will be fine..." But he's shaking, and his skin feels cold. Somehow his blood on my hands is worse than the lives I've taken.

What the HELL? I didn't expect him to actually fucking shoot the door! But all three of them come barging in, Quatre first, falling to his knees next to us as he sees what I'm trying to protect - Heero's secret. "Quatre, he's gonna be fine, something happened, I think he was trying to do some repair work, but I can't stop the bleeding - dammit, just shut the door!"

And he's crying, him and Trowa, and I look down and realize that this looks pretty bad, but at least I got the words covered, right? I mean... save him that humiliation, at least. He's got to fucking talk about this. I have no fucking clue how I can explain us out of this. I can't believe I lied.

"Shit! Oh my God, Duo, what the hell happened? Did he fall into a fucking meat shredder? WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON!" Fuck you, Trowa... I didn't think you knew those words though. Can't you see I'm trying to fix this? Can't you see the look in his eyes? His... eyes... are so deep, like bottomless oceans, but he looks so innocent.. so childlike... and he reaches, reaches for me, his hand spasming as pain wracks his body, crying out over and over again. Something's wrong.

"I don't know what to do! He's just fucking bleeding, and I don't know what to do! I can't make it stop, and you just fucking barge in here -- and don't even think about it, NO HOSPITALS! I won't do that to him -- Wait, where the hell is he bleeding from?"

No. Oh, no. Hands shake as I cut his clothes off and stare blindly at the echo of my own pain - he'd slashed himself. Hard. The same fucking spot that he stitched on me. Deep and brutal, the edges jagged and I can't even see how bad it is through the blood. He didn't. Tell me he didn't.

"Oh, God!" The world seems really far away now, everyone talking around me as I sit and stare. We sit, together, on the floor of his Gundam, staring at each other. And I can't tell what hurts the most right now.


	13. Rewind

Don't own 'em. Want plushie. 

_

* * *

So dark._

_And it's raining; the ground cracked and dry, filling up with water that spills over, barely able to saturate the dirt. Blood on my hands, gun cocked, ready - aim - didn't even know what hit him._

_The world becomes distorted and fades into something else. Night. Instead of stars, weapons are hurling through the sky. Someone next to me. Duo, scoping out the enemy. Duo, planting the explosives. Duo, pressing the trigger. Duo, screaming, seeing small faces peek out the window curiously at the sounds disappearing into a fireball._

_Stop.  
Fade.  
Time lurches.  
Play._

_A clinic. A lab? Sterile. Cold. The fucking son of a bitch who did this to me in the first place, walking through a door - strapped to a table - what the hell? Why haven't I ever remembered this? The look in his eyes as he jams in the needle. The sick smile as I convulse. The world turning red and I break the steel, eyes scanning back and forth, the "Doctor" behind bulletproof glass, six soldiers with guns advancing. Dead in minutes as I sink to the floor, holding my head in my hands, screaming in pain._

_Stop.  
Fade.  
Time rushes back, back, farther and farther.  
Play._

_The lab, years before. Less equipment, less men needed to keep me in check. A younger Perfect Soldier, not yet perfect, not yet a soldier, but something inbetween. I still feel the slightest inkling of fear as I hold a gun, too large for my hands. Surrounded by forest, a fake, climate-controlled forest, torrential rain pushing me back as my eyes scan the underbrush. Hope rising, maybe it won't be so bad this time - a startled scream held back as something large and dark charges at me, dark and deadly. I fire._

_Stop.  
Fade.  
Just a little farther.  
Play._

_A cell, this time. Younger, afraid, nothing chemical or mechanical - or alchemical - rushing through my veins, not yet. Shackles that I'm too young, too weak to escape. Kneeling with my forehead against the wall, naked, huddling close to the cold concrete. The door opens. The world spins and shatters as I scream, the soldiers filing in to break in their new experimental subject._

_Stop.  
Knives piercing my eyes, the world shifting back, memories chemically torn away.  
Too late to save him. Don't bother trying.  
Play._

_A small Heero, one that remembers his family - one living with his family. Pain. Death. Confusion, not understanding what has happened. Crying, hugging a bear, and a man comes, holding out his hand. Maybe he's nice, I think. Taking his hand, I willingly walk into my own personal hell._

_Stop.  
Just stop. I can't do this anymore. Why is this happening?  
It's too late to stop them. Let the wounds bleed free.  
Play._

_The first prick of a needle, the first violent illness from chemical enhancement gone wrong. The first gunshot wound, the first time I suture myself. The first time I realize what I can do. The first time I realize what they're making me into. The first time I fight and end up hanging from a wall, electrodes taped to my skin. The first time I realize I can't feel a damn thing anymore._

_Stop.  
My childhood. My adolescence. My life, screaming through my skull, memories pounding one after another in sequence and scattered, again and again, screaming.  
Fade.  
This is why I bleed.  
Play, or checkmate? The future is too far away now._


	14. Catastrophies and Coffins

Don't own 'em. Want plushie.

* * *

The slow procession winds toward a grassy field, a stony silence in the air as soldiers - boys, no more than that - carry a heavy burden. A hole, dark and tormented, gouged deep into the earth; a swiftly made pine box still slick on the inside with crimson tears...

* * *

I think that was the worst dream I've had about this whole situation. That... that... he's gone, that I couldn't save him. Hell, at this point, I don't know if I want to save him; maybe he would be better off if we let him slip away. Maybe he would find relief if he faded into the cold nothingness; it might feel like home, to him, so often staring at the stars from such an intimate viewpoint.

He won't talk, he hasn't been awake much since that night. It seems so long ago, but it was less than a week ago when I found him, broken and bleeding on the floor of his Gundam. There are simply no words to describe what he's done to himself. How can people hurt kids this way? That's what he's acted like, sometimes, when he's woken up. A kid, just a kid, screaming.

And I've been sitting by his bed ever since.

The other guys don't get it and are too afraid to ask, hushed whispers and confused conversations, and it's hard to tell if they believe me or not. And I sure as hell won't let them anywhere near Heero to find out.

"Cold..."

Every time he's awake my heart lurches, a block of ice settles in the pit of my stomach. I never know if I'll get him barely conscious, childlike, trigger-happy...

Blankets are piled on top of him and the only one left is mine. To my surprise, he pulled it closer, nuzzling his face into it; I guess I'm getting the barely-aware, vulnerable Heero. I hate to say it, but that's the best one; the least terrifying.

"Duo," he sighed, and I find myself lost... such a pretty blue. It's almost impossible to bring myself to look away and actually talk to him, but I tuck him in nonetheless and settle down in my chair again.

"Yeah?"

"Sorry," he mumbled, voice still thick with sleep and meds, maybe a little pain. Then again, with Heero, it's hard to tell; he could just be uncomfortable. He could be in a stormy rage but too drugged to do anything about it. Who the hell knows?

"You didn't do anything wrong," I replied quietly. This has been a common theme in the talks we've had while he's been laid up in bed; he always feels sorry for... something. He never stays awake long enough to say what.

"Did," the soft, sleepy voice slurred, and he looked up at me - I think my heart just stopped. So honest, so ... so... gentle. My Heero, gentle? Is that word even in his vocabulary? "Let... let you find me. Wasn't... good. Hurt you..." So sad, here. And I can never stand to let him be sad, even though I feel like my soul is breaking.

"Heero... I knew about what you do, and you know I won't stop you. You just... went a little too far, that's all." That's all? That's ALL? Inside I'm screaming about the fact that his body was shredded, flesh rended almost into bloody strips. Long, deep slashes on his arms, criss-crossing randomly like shots on a battle field. Words carved into his skin, hard and ugly, ragged edges full of feeling. And he fucking stabbed himself. That's what I'm pissed about.

"Saw things I didn't want to see. Wanted to forget," he whispered, wincing as he tried to shift onto his side. "But I just remembered more..." He seems more coherent, and I can't tell if that's a good thing or not. His voice was still raw from screaming. "Too much, don't want to think anymore. Please." God, after that, can I really ask him what's going on?


	15. The Heero Awakens

Don't own, want plushie. Sorry this one's so short - it's kind of a transition chapter, a little bit. (don't worry, the angst stays, probably until the end of this, which is a long, long way off ;P)

* * *

The world spun dizzily as I ascended from the darkness, forcing my awareness fully into the terror of consciousness. I remember so little of my time in the void; so little of what brought me there in the first place. Nothing feels colder than my heart.

An arm was haphazardly thrown around my waist, slung low at my hips, lest... that's right. I remember now - the blood. I remember the flashbacks - the lab. The "doctor" that raped me with his syringes full of DNA-altering chemicals. The assistants who did far more than that. The fact that I may no longer even qualify as fully human.

I wonder what I'd look like if someone took me apart.

The slow burn of my abdomen told me that I'd cut through muscle... and also that I'd been asleep for quite some time. It didn't even hurt as I sat up, staring down at Duo's sleeping form. My angel... my own hero, perversely. I remember his words; the way he covered what I'd "written" in my own flesh.

In my own language: Please kill me.

He looked in pain even as he slept - tossing and turning lightly as he dreamed, his leg twitching as if he were a dog with dreams of chasing rabbits. I smoothed his hair back quietly, gazing down at him and sighed, looking around. The memories were flooding back slowly but surely: exactly what I had fucking tried to prevent.

"Heero," he cried in a choked voice, curling up tightly next to me, sobbing in his sleep. Gathering him into my arms, I sighed, feeling his weight tug on the stitches, relaxing into the pain - it helped, for now.

"I'm here, koi," I murmured, watching the ceiling. Maybe it would do something interesting to distract me. Dance for me, ceiling tiles, take me away from here.

All right, even I know that sounded lame.

He clung to me tightly, forcing a soft grunt from my throat and a slow, lazy smile. Some of the stitches were pulling open, and it entranced me. Regardless... I couldn't hurt Duo, not right now. God forbid he wake up to me with a knife halfway through my wrist. That just wouldn't do. "What are you dreaming of?"

"Don't leave me..." he whispered, huddling close to me like a forlorn child, hiccuping in the midst of his sobs. "Don't. Don't leave. Stay with me..." Stay with him? What the hell does it look like I'm doing? I'm not trying to kill myself, I have missions to complete. I have a job to do. Killing myself is the farthest thing from my mind.

In retrospect, I suppose it might look otherwise, but that is not what this is all about.

"I'm here," I whispered once more. "I'm not going to leave you."

Sleepy violet eyes slowly opened to meet my own. "Promise?" he whispered, his voice a soft, lisping tone - he obviously wasn't really awake. I simply nodded, stroking his cheek lightly, watching the fear fade from his gaze. "Love you..."

Oh for fuck's sake, did he really have to say that? Why does he always do this to me? Why does he always say that when he falls asleep? This is getting ridiculous.

Now I'm going to spend the next three hours wondering if he meant it.

Glancing down at my forearm, I sighed, reading what my pain-induced psychosis had produced.

"I'm so sorry"

Duo, my love... I need your help, your strength. How can I ask this of you when I can't even admit that I see you as more than just another pilot?

How can I tell you I love you when I want to carve out the memories one by one?


	16. Distractions

A) I am so sorry I've let this go for so long. I'm a little rusty, and this chapter is not my best. However, it's a sign that this story is not dead.

B) I don't own Gundam Wing, but I do now own the first half of the GW series on DVD!

C) If you're actually reading this, bless you for your patience over the last TWO YEARS. My God, I'm a slacker. More updates to come - hopefully a hell of a lot sooner than they have been!

* * *

Sometimes I can understand why people have such terrible views about self-injury. Thinking about it realistically, it's purposely creating pain and promoting an environment for infection, inflicting it on yourself intentionally. This cannot possibly seem sane - and why else would someone do such a thing if they didn't mean to end their lives? My thoughts drifted to this every so often as I watched Heero's muscles flex, his gaze determined as he started trying to fix the fact that the door to his Gundam no longer shut.

What, you expected three pilots to kick a door in and have it working when they were done with it?

Quite frankly, I was more than a little surprised that there was no major confrontation after the fact - the other pilots seemed to be giving Heero a wide berth, trusting that he would work out his little psychotic episode on his own. We all had breaks like this eventually - it was one of the hazards of the job, a penance we paid for taking lives haphazardly. Turning boys into terrorists tended to take a toll on the soul, just a bit.

Heero's introspection over the last few days made me more than a little curious about his past. Really - our training was so very different, producing a ragtag group of pilots with such very different skill sets. Each of us has our specialties; Heero's specialty is assassination. Mine is wide-spread destruction. Is it any wonder that I scream my pain to the world, when I bother to show it, and he hides his, wrapped in a neat little bullet of agony?

Sometimes I feel like his poetic...ish...ness is rubbing off on me. (At least, up until that last mangling of the English language.)

You see? This is what happens when I try to sit down and really think about the state of my life and what I should do about Heero. I have a mind like a demented goldfish. I start thinking about life outside the bowl, and then the pretty pebble I've tried to eat six thousand times comes up and hits me in the face because I think it's shiny.

Three-second attention span aside, and altogether ignoring the fact that Heero has a very FINE rear-end when it's wrapped in that Spandex, it's safe enough to leave him alone for now. The monster within him is sated after his latest incident; his eyes are shining softly again, glittering with amusement as I untangle myself from the tree I'd climbed up to watch him. Wandering back towards the house, the "no major confrontation" rule gets shot to hell as Quatre finds, corners, and fillets me in the kitchen.

"I really wish you'd stop lying to me, Duo," his soft voice cut through the blender's roar with ease. Have you ever noticed that about him? No matter what you're doing, no matter how loud the world is, no matter how much you scream - and trust me, I've tried - you can't silence the sound of his voice. It's something about that gentle tone that penetrates past hearing and goes straight to your heart. I don't know much about emotions, sometimes, but somehow I think this is a Very Bad Thing for the upcoming conversation.

"Lying? I don't lie." Isn't that my motto? I may run and hide, but I never tell a lie. Something inside me winces as my heart automatically responds, _unless it's to protect Heero_.

"Duo, I'm going to be very honest with you." Soft blond hair fell lightly across his eyes; the pacifist gazed at me calmly, bright eyes tracking my every movement. Many people have said many cruel things about my peaceful friend, but Quatre is no idiot - and he's just as sharp and to-the-point as the rest of us, if necessary. Sometimes kindness kills.

"I don't think anyone but Trowa knows that I'm an empath - and now you know. I know you understand what that word means, despite the fact that you try to convince us that you're an uneducated moron. Heero is usually very tightly-wrapped and doesn't let his feelings leak out, but I have never felt anything even close to what I felt that night, from anyone - and that includes everything I've felt during missions. Something is killing him, and if he doesn't get it out, he is going to die, no matter how much he cares about you or anyone else." Quatre paused, leaning over to turn the blender off and stare directly into my eyes. "I know what he does to himself, I know a little about how he feels, but I don't know why. I can only help if he lets me - and no matter how much I want to, no matter what I wish I could do for him, he wants you. I understand; sometimes only Trowa can handle my darkness. I'm not going to tell the others what I know, but I just thought you deserved the honesty - and the warning that if you fuck this up, it is going to be the shitstorm of all time." With that, he walked out the door as quietly as he'd come in, leaving me clutching the counter as the world spun around my ears.

I still feel guilty that the first rational thought that came to mind was "He just compared Heero and I to him and Trowa." The second involved words that are probably best left unsaid as I hit my knee on one of the drawer knobs below the counter.

Wonderful. The only empathic person I've ever met, and he's convinced that the world revolves around my mistakes.


	17. Fixing What's Broken

Don't own 'em, wish like hell I did. Thank you for the reviews and for sticking with me; this story's going places. It might not end up where I thought it would, but that's the way fanfic goes.

(In response to a previous comment: Self-injury is rarely a suicidal gesture. Often, it's a way of keeping yourself alive - to get out emotions that you can't deal with/to feel something/to stop a dissociative process etc.)

* * *

Working on my Gundam always soothes something within me; the feel of metal beneath my hands, bending immovable forces to my will and repairing something that is supposedly irreparably broken. Fixing the broken - it's something that I wish I could do with myself, a desire so strong that I cannot ignore it, cannot refute the desperate need to put myself back together, even when I can't remember falling apart.

I haven't told Duo yet that a mission came in last night; that shortly after he whispered those words (Love you... love you... love you; his voice has been whispering in my mind ever since he spoke those words, and I still can't but help wondering if he was really speaking to me), I crawled out from under his sleeping form and answered the insistent soft beeps at my laptop. He isn't going to like it - not now, not so soon after he was injured, after I... well. I can't say no; I am not meant to refuse a mission.

I have never refused a mission. I've never even considered it.

And yet it's so very tempting to type "Rejected;" to exert my free will and say no. The thought cracked a gaping cavern inside of me, wide and untapped, rage and pain shuddering through my body as I grasped my desk, denting the metal. My vision turned red as I typed "Accepted" into the screen, slumping against the hard chair as the pain recedes.

That had certainly been unexpected.

* * *

I didn't mind when Duo left; it gave me a chance to contemplate what I was going to tell him. Shadows of memory had begun to seep through in my dreams, vague remembrances of things better left unsaid; things recalled from my past, my childhood - though it's laughable to think I ever had one. It's been - what - four years since I met Duo, since I joined the other pilots - and still I am the outsider, the outlier in the mathematics, the side-liner that can never fully participate. I know that I'm called the Perfect Soldier - hell, I've done nothing but live my life to perpetuate that rumor - and yet I will admit to the fear that pulses through my veins at the sheer thought of asking Duo what he's gone through. I know what we all know - Duo the street rat, Duo the church orphan, I know the story that he has told us all and yet -

And yet, if I admit it to myself, when I look into his eyes, there's a tightness there, a dark hallway with a closed door behind those violet orbs, stories that are the cause of the tough interior that he hides behind his laughter and jokes. We all have our specialties - I try not to think of what his would do to him, unless he needs my silent presence in the darkness, a silent pillar to his nightmares.

The feeling of a wrench held tightly in my hand calls me back to the present, a sound in the distance; footsteps walking closer. It takes everything within me not to level my pistol at Trowa as he waits silently outside of my Gundam for an invitation. A nod, and he joins me. The banged pilot sits thoughtfully across from me as I work to fix the latch on the door, carefully rewiring the mechanisms and unseen traps riddled therein. Many find his reticence to speak difficult to deal with; quite frankly, I find it refreshing. So many people - and several of the other pilots - have this terrible habit of needing to say something, anything, to sever the silence down the middle, a clean cut of contemplating, lest someone begin to think too hard and come to an unsavory revelation.

My revelations are almost always unsavory, and when they aren't - a good example being my feelings for Duo - I have absolutely no idea what the hell I'm supposed to do with them, so really, a fear of silence is rather asinine.

"Quatre's worried."

I waited, jerking my hand away as the door panel sparked, waiting for the wires to cool down. I knew with Trowa there was always more than that; he talked a great deal more than people gave him credit for, if you could only wait for him to find the right words.

"Wufei thinks you're suicidal."

I snorted. "By his standards, all of us are suicidal." This was true, if a bit questionable; Duo drives so fast that it's impossible to believe he doesn't secretly have a death wish. Trowa is silent, and _obviously_ keeping his dark feelings to himself. Quatre is terribly sensitive, and that will be the end of him. And I, of course, purposely injure myself. Regardless of the fact that my methods of keeping myself relatively sane are somewhat circumspect, I do not intend to die. Wufei is the lone holdout of perfection - he simply has rageful energy, according to His Highness.

He waited until I had pliers in my mouth and hot wires beneath my fingers to speak. "I think you need to talk to Duo. Whatever's bothering you is too deep to surface on its own. Obviously you trust him the most - you should use that to your advantage. Quatre thinks it could help your memories come back."

Fortunately, my concentration held enough so that I didn't shock myself again. The door slid shut, and I sighed, beginning to refit the panel. "What makes you think I'm having issues with my memory?"

He merely grunted. "When you were injured, you screamed while you were out of it. Quatre caught the edges of what you were feeling, and he couldn't sleep for days. I assumed it was because whatever it was you were feeling was deep, hidden, and dark." The banged pilot shrugged. "I assume that if you're having nightmares, you need help. Duo's good at that. He helped me, once. Don't take it for granted." The boy stood, opening the door and walking away as quietly as he'd entered.

My thoughts were jumbled as he left. None of us ever talked about what relationships we'd formed during the war; all of us assumed, but Trowa had all but just admitted that he and Quatre were spending nights together. And he'd almost implied that he thought Duo and I had that type of relationship. We all knew that Quatre was sensitive, but... until today, I didn't really put faith into the idea of empathy. If Quatre had felt my nightmares...

The pliers fell to my feet. They knew how I felt about Duo. What if someone told him?


End file.
